


It's not about the winning

by CruelisnotMason



Category: She-Ra and the Princesses of Power (2018)
Genre: Christmas, Christmas Party, F/F, First Kiss, Fluff and Angst, Post-Canon, Ugly Holiday Sweaters, Ugly Sweaters, baby gay adora
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-04-07
Updated: 2019-04-07
Packaged: 2020-01-06 06:02:46
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,529
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18382442
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/CruelisnotMason/pseuds/CruelisnotMason
Summary: Adora furrows her brows. It’s an ugly sweater – obviously. She thinks back of when they first told her about the party – with her only half listening and honestly not invested enough about another official event for the princesses… shit, so it actually was her own fault.“So, everyone’s looking good tonight?”, Adora whines and grabs her bottle to have something to hold on.___________________________After she's been thrown off a cliff and left all on her own by her, Adora sees Catra on a 'Cute Sweater Party'.





	It's not about the winning

**Author's Note:**

> Soooooooo  
> "Christmas fic"...it's not an april's fools joke, I swear. It's what happens when you plan to write another Catradora Fic & procrastinate it since december.
> 
> If anyone wants to be my professional summary writer - I hugely suck at it. Anyways. Enjoy!

 

 

Adora holds a beer in her hand – she didn’t know that being a princess came with tons of obligations to follow, tons of things to do and tons of events to attend – although she’s slowly realizing that she might have been lied to over several things by Glimmer and Bow about this particular one.

“Cute Christmas Sweater Party!”, Bow screeches into her face and throws some confetti. He holds Glimmer in his arm and swings back and forth together with her. “Are you sure I need to be here?”, Adora asks him and lets her gaze wander around the enormous ballroom, “I don’t think I see Frosta either-“

Before Glimmer can tell her another obvious excuse why Adora has to party with them, Adora stops in her tracks – looks back at Bow and Glimmer and slaps one hand against her cheek. “Did you just say, ‘Cute Christmas Sweater Party’?!”

“Uh, yeah, indeed I said that! What do you think about our cute sweaters, Adora?”, Bow is looking sheepish, swaying around some more to let Adora get a good look at his cropped sweater.

“Uh, nice”, Adora says, then looks at Glimmer respectively. She’s wearing a wide pink and lilac sweater with white snowballs on it – it’s glittering all over.

“Damn that’s cute”, Adora whispers to herself, then turns to Bow: “Did you lie to me about the theme of this party?”

“Uh, noo, Adora. Why should I?”, Bow says looking oblivious, exchanging a look with Glimmer. It’s only until his gaze drops down to Adora’s clothes. It’s hideous enough for him to press out a small startled and screech.

“Adora, what is this?!”

Adora furrows her brows. It’s an ugly sweater – obviously. She thinks back of when they first told her about the party – with her only half listening and honestly not invested enough about another official event for the princesses… shit, so it actually _was_ her own fault.

“So, everyone’s looking good tonight?”, Adora whines and grabs her bottle to have something to hold on. Bow covers his open mouth with a hand in the utmost scandalized way. Glimmer also still looks at her, takes her appearance in. She exhales loudly and nods.

“Yup”, she says and hugs her, then pats her back, “don’t worry, Adora! You’re still beautiful, and we love you, right Bow? If you don’t feel like partying, there’s no need to stay, too”, when she retrieves from the hug and Bow still hasn’t said something, she elbows him into the side.

“Ahhh, yeah. Sure.” He rubs his side and takes a few steps back, “aaand, maybe you should stay away from the stage for at least a little bit, only until the ‘cutest sweater competition’ is over. I don’t want your shady sweater”, he looks at it with raised eyebrows, “to overthrow our beautiful sweaters with its, uhm, personality.”

“What?”, Adora shouts offended and a few heads turn to their direction – social customs aren’t her specialty. “What?”, she half whispers-half shouts again.

“See you later!”, Bow is already on the run. “See you later, Adora!”, Glimmer shouts, while being dragged away from Bow.

Adora drops her gaze down to her sweater, too. When she thought it was a competition of hideous sweaters, she wanted her sweater to be a special kind of hideous to stand out, just because she’s more ambitious than is good for her, just because she wanted the ugliest sweater of all sweaters, to exceed at a task that has been given (or not) to her.

She’s a fool.

Now that Bow, and Glimmer are gone, who knows where, Adora is left to herself. She notices a few princesses coming in with their friends and partners, but everyone seems to be occupied already, and Adora doesn’t want to be an intruder. She knows that her friends didn’t leave her alone out of spite, but because they don’t know how awkward she feels when she’s among others she doesn’t know. Some people also seem to back away at the sight of Adora’s sweater and she can’t really blame them for that.

Back in the Horde she never had to face the issue of social anxiety or being unpopular. For the most part of her life, she never thought she wouldn’t belong to the Horde. Equally, she never had issues getting to know others – she had been there from the beginning, growing up with everyone. Nothing new, nothing unstable.

It was good to change sides and work for the rebellion after finding out what the Horde was doing, but oh boy, did she feel alone sometimes.

It doesn’t take long for her mind to wander towards painful thoughts of her ex-best friend from the Horde and how she missed her. Missed being with her. Missed talking to her.

It doesn’t take long for her to start thinking how she wants to lie down again in her old bed in that old life of hers, right next to Catra who listens to her talking or complaining, who nods along and holds her when she’s down. She thinks of the Catra who would never let her fall off a cliff – who wouldn’t hurt her new friends and family. The Catra she loved, the one of whom she wasn’t sure if she ever was the real Catra or not.

Adora thinks that if she wishes deeply enough for Catra to be back, she might just appear out of thin air.

And it must work somehow – thinking about what she desperately seeks right now to appear right in front of her eyes, because there’s no other way explaining that there Catra is, standing in the entrance on the opposite side of the room, wearing an equally ugly sweater as Adora does. Behind her it’s Scorpia who slips into the room, broad shoulders, strangely adorable and goofy smile on her lips.

“Wha—what?”, Adora exclaims and jumps forward. It’s not a daydream, she realizes, it’s the real deal.

Her fight mode kicks in and she’s ready to run and fight them both but before she can make her move, she’s held back by a guard.

“It’s in the rules to let all princesses take part in the events”, he explains with a low voice to Adora, “but don’t be afraid, She-Ra. We made sure to increase the security on them. She-Ra doesn’t have to get herself in trouble.” A polite nod and the guard is gone. Adora can’t believe they let them in again and then prevent her from investigating them herself.

She may not be able to run to them while holding her sword in her grip, ready to attack, but she can casually just walk by them, talk to them, and prevent them from doing something sketchy. At least that’s what she thinks.

It’s Catra who notices her first. She and Scorpia are standing in front of the buffet with Scorpia’s back turned to her, busy picking some of her favorite foods.

At her sight, Catra lets out a breath she’s been holding – the small bell that’s attached to her ugly sweater is ringing with the movement of her chest. “Adora”, she sighs, using her pleasant but teasing voice, which, if Adora could be honest to anyone about those things, has been doing things to _her_ lately. It’s what haunts her before and during her sleep and makes her squeeze her legs together when she’s thinking about it.

“Catra”, she says, with stern voice and clenched fists in desperate need to not give anyone the smallest idea what she’s feeling right now. Then she looks to Scorpia who’s too occupied with the food on her plate. “Scorpia”, she greets her anyways, because she’s a decent person.

“Hey Adora”, Scorpia greets back, not even turning her head to her, “funny meeting you here!”, she exclaims, oblivious to the situation.

“Could say the same about you two”, Adora gives the ball right back, grinding her teeth.

“Aw, don’t be like that, Adora, what’s with that cold attitude?”, Catra says in a bored tone. She’s used to being teased by Catra, but as used she is to that tone in her voice, she’s not used to Catra not meeting her eyes.

Something’s off, different than usual. Different from before the time, when Catra dropped her into the fucking void.

Adora folds her arms in front of her chest, her mouth turned downwards and her eyes red. “Surprised?”, she growls. She looks at Scorpia’s back while she’s still occupied with choosing the best snacks from the buffet table, then back at Catra. Her face is unreadable, even when the cat lady finally meets her gaze. Adora holds it and suddenly feels a helplessness wash over her.

It doesn’t matter, because Scorpia is loud enough to startle them both. “Well, ladies, this party is tooooight!” Her mouth is full, her claws gripping her plate tightly. “Oh, hey Adora, you’re still here!”, she exclaims muffled, mouth full of treats.

With one look at Scorpia’s careless attitude, she decides that she can’t let her guard down, no matter what they look like, being here. They attacked once, why wouldn’t they twice?

“Whatever you two plan I’m going to get behind it”, she tells Catra, voice low and angry. She grips her at the collar and yanks her close. Catra tries to move back, her eyes looking uneasy. Adora lets her go in an instant; if the guards are throwing her out because of her misbehavior, there won’t be enough people at the party to protect them from the Horde. Adora looks at her sweater, which is, well, pretty ugly, too. Maybe she didn’t get it either.

Catra puts her hands on her hips. “We’re planning such bad things, Adora. You won’t get behind it, ever”, she pokes her tongue at her.

Adora tries to not think of Catra’s tongue when she turns around, head red to the ears, and flees.

 

She rejoined with Bow and Glimmer to warn them, but even though they listen to her warnings, they don’t take it too seriously. The last time had been disastrous, but this time the guards are informed and prepared – even outside the castle there are guards stationed.

Adora thinks about what Catra has planned and comes up with…nothing at all.

She’s walking outside on the grand patio, where it’s dark already, and the moon shines bright. She nurses on her bottle of beer, not totally used to the taste by now, even if the Princesses tend to get together casually and drink something now and then.

She doesn’t miss the rustling coming from above, but she still startles at the sight of Catra jumping down. She lands elegantly – because she always does – right in front of Adora and grins. “Spare me”, Adora sighs, before Catra can open her mouth and greet her, “and just get away. I don’t care if you’re here to attack, just start it. Don’t talk with me.”

The feeling of being dropped into an unknown nothing remains unforgotten in her mind and she’s mad, honestly mad for the first time in her life, because of Catra. Adora has always been forgiving, but not this time.

This time, it’s personal.

Catra opens her mouth, then closes it.

“That’s a fucking ugly sweater”, she proceeds to say and pull on a string of the sawn on material, “you kinda went overboard with that.”

There’s not the usual tease in her voice, even more it’s just blunt for her to say this.

“Yeah, right”, Adora is in no mood to humor her. “Yours definitely looks better with all the bells on. What are you, a cow?”, she points her bottle at Catra.

Catra doesn’t throw a comeback at her, just eyes her suspiciously.

“I’m- “, she trails off, takes Adora’s arm and raises it, looks beneath it, even shoves the sleeve back a little, “I’m, yeah. Whatever you say.”

Adora stumbles back, Catra goes with her. She’s up close now, eyeing her face, takes her chin to raise it a bit. She’s close, so close that Adora feels if she doesn’t go soon, she will press herself to Catra and start kissing her.

Catra doesn’t look at her, she examines all of Adora’s body instead. “What’s this about?”, Adora murmurs, too weak to shout or raise her voice. Catra doesn’t answer – her two different colored eyes move towards hers, and they stare at each other for a whole while.

“Adora”, she murmurs, “I knew you’ll be fine.”

That’s the last straw, Adora pushes her away, hard enough for Catra to tumble backwards and fall on her ass. Adora puts one knee on each side of her former friend, pushes Catra’s hands down, hard enough for her to not dare moving, but also not as hard as she could.

“What the fuck is that supposed to mean, Catra?”, she whispers, eyes wide and brows furrowed. “You just thought I’d be okay? After you leaving me in there to die? You just tried your luck, see if I’m coming back out? And if not, you’d be just going on with your day and think ‘huh, she didn’t make it. Who would have thought?’?” Catra stares at her, something like guilt forming in her expression.

She just lies there – Adora is hovering over her – it’s for once a sight reversed.

“I-“, Catra starts, her lip quivering and her eyes are closed, but she bites down hard, but suddenly her face changes, from guilt to anger , “let me go, Adora.”

“No”, Adora says, holds her in place, “answer me, now! Or otherwise…”, she looks around, “I will rip those silly bells from your sweater!”

It’s warm here, in the princess kingdom, no snow insight. At least the sweaters aren’t too warm in the evening.

“Do as you please”, Catra clenches out between her teeth, but her gaze is vulnerable.

_Do as you please._

There’s a lot she wants to do, although strangling Catra isn’t one of them. Why, after all, can’t she hate her enough? It’s different from thinking of Catra as her friend, and she had always, always been her friend.

“Do what I want?”, she asks, but doesn’t await permission. Her lips are in a thin line, and she can’t stop her heart from beating. Catra must be able to hear it, up so close to her. Her eyes shine, then she’s licking her lips. Her mouth goes dry. This isn’t friendship. It’s hatred - but not enough to forget everything else.

Catra makes a surprised sound when Adora leans down and presses her mouth against hers. She’s not moving, unclenching and clenching her hands, but Adora is loosening her grip, making it able for her to push her away, if she wants to.

Catra doesn’t.

It’s getting breathy, messy, and Adora doesn’t know if it’s just her, but she will surely lose her mind soon, if she doesn’t stop-

“I’ve won the ugly sweater contest”, Adora tells her and gets up from where they were lying, goes back inside where she finds Bow and Glimmer. They look at her with worried gazes, when she excuses herself from the party and tells them to message her if anything should happen.

But it stays quiet, that night.

 

 

 

 

 

**Author's Note:**

> Find me on [twitter](https://twitter.com/CruelisB) & [tumblr](https://www.tumblr.com/blog/cruelisblue) and scream with me about Catradora?
> 
> _________________________
> 
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